


All I Want for Christmas

by PrayForRain



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Christmas, Fluff, Gen, Pack Family, Pre-Slash
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-25
Updated: 2012-12-25
Packaged: 2017-11-22 09:20:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,171
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/608260
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PrayForRain/pseuds/PrayForRain
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's the first Christmas since Laura's death; the first Christmas where Derek is truly and completely alone.</p><p>Luckily, or maybe unluckily, for him, Stiles refuses to let him be alone and drags Scott along for the ride in order to remind Derek that, yeah, it sucks, but he's not nearly as alone as he thinks.</p>
            </blockquote>





	All I Want for Christmas

**Author's Note:**

> Just a little fluffy Christmas fic that was in my head ever since I stumbled across a rather painful post no Tumblr. So, here it is! I hope you enjoy.

**All I Want for Christmas**

It’s the first Christmas since he lost Laura. The first Christmas where he is utterly and completely alone. He thought he was used to being by himself. After all, he’d had a while to get used to it.

But then, he starts remembering. It’s a small thing at first. Just seeing a teenaged girl and her younger brother trying to pick out a tree while their long-suffering father stands with his hands in the pocket of his windbreaker, but something about the girl immediately reminds him of Laura.

After that, every single thing is a reminder of her. The trees going up in shop windows, the families bustling about trying to get their Christmas shopping done, even the songs playing on nearly every station. Laura had loved Christmas; it was her favorite holiday, and she’d been very vocal about that. Granted, she’d been vocal about everything—she wasn’t ashamed of any part of herself.

She’d always been the strong one. Sure, he had made a good show of it with Scott and the rest of his new Pack; he went out of his way to seem like he always had it together, that he was the one in charge. But deep down, he knew the truth—he wasn’t nearly as strong as he pretended to be.

He missed his sister. She had been all he had after the rest of their family died, and she was always there, a constant presence. Every year, no matter how broke they were, she found some way of getting him a present. It wasn’t always anything great; usually, it was just a picture of them or something like that, but this year, there would be no picture. There would be no present at all. Laura was gone; no longer could she be a constant presence and a source of strength for him. She was simply gone, all because their uncle wanted to be alpha.

No, he definitely wasn’t strong.

Which was why he wasn’t having an easy time of it this year. He had sent the rest of his Pack home for the holidays; even Isaac had a cousin he was spending the holiday with, and Derek was happy about that. He hadn’t wanted this year to be a pity party for the both of them. One sulky werewolf was enough.

Tossing a log into the fire, Derek sighed and dragged his knees up towards his chest, wrapping his arms loosely around them. It’s not that cold; even if he wasn’t a werewolf, the weather this year was warmer than usual. Still, the fire is oddly comforting. Its merry popping distracts him from the empty silence of his small underground home. Any noise is better than no noise when the silence only serves to reminds him of how very much alone he is.

~*~

“Do we have to do this?” Scott moaned, earning yet another glare from Stiles. “Allison invited me to dinner and I could still catch her.”

“Oh my god, if you complain one more time,” Stiles shot back, “How many times do I have to tell you?”

“You don’t even _like_ Derek!”

Stiles paused, drumming his fingers on the stirring wheel. They were stuck in traffic, headed to the entrance to Derek’s little hideout, and they hadn’t moved for ages. Stiles was beginning to wonder if they were ever going to get there. “Okay, I’ll admit it, the guy doesn’t make it easy to like him. But you don’t know what it’s like, do you?”

“What what’s like?” Scott asked, his face scrunching up in the perfect expression of confusion.

“This is the first year,” Stiles said, hoping to inspire some kind of epiphany in his best friend, but really, he should have known it’d be harder than that.

“First year for what?”

“It’s his first year without his sister!” Stiles half shouted. “He’s all alone for the first time in his life. I was lucky; when Mom died…” he swallowed, “At least there was my dad. But Derek…she was the last person in his family. He’s got nobody to help him through this.”

“Oh…” Scott mutters, having the decency to at least look half-ashamed of himself. “I guess that makes sense. But…” He glanced at Stiles’s head. “Do you really need to wear those things?”

“What’s wrong with my antlers?” Stiles said, reaching up to touch the soft antlers on his headband. “I think they’re festive!”

“If by ‘festive’ you mean ‘stupid,’” Scott laughed, earning him a punch in the shoulder from Stiles. “It’s moving.” Scott pointed at the traffic.

“Hail Baby Jesus!” Stiles exalted, grinning. “At this rate, we might actually make it to Derek’s before Christmas morning!”

~*~

Derek didn’t realize he was dozing off until the sound of voices suddenly filtered through the old bus station and he awoke with a start. Quickly, he was on high alert. Nobody should be down here.

Growling low in his throat, he shifted, his eyes turning blood red. To be honest, he was thankful that there was an intruder. He would just love something to rip apart on a night like this. Sticking close to the shadows, he made his way towards the voices. Finally, their shapes came into view, though they didn’t seem to have noticed him just yet. Perfect.

With a roar, he launched himself at the intruders, grabbing one of them and pushing him against a wall. “What are you doing here!?” he growled.

“Wow, we have got to stop meeting like this,” replied a familiar voice.

“Stiles?” Derek asked, unable to hide his confusion.

“I prefer St. Nick. I come bearing gifts,” Stiles said, holding up his hands, which were weighted down by a couple of bags.

“Put him down, Derek,” Scott growled.

Derek rolled his eyes, but did as Scott said. “You shouldn’t be here,” he told them, turning and stalking back towards his fire.

“I told you,” Scott muttered, “Same Derek as always.”

Derek tried to pretend not to hear it, but of course, his ears were extremely sensitive. “Is there a specific reason you’re here, tonight of all nights?”

“Uh, I told you, dude. I come bearing gifts,” Stiles jogged to catch up with him. He handed the bags to Derek, just as Derek moved to sit down by the fire.

Derek caught his eyes. “What’s the catch…?” he asked.

“No catch. Just Christmas Spirit.” Stiles flopped down on a set of old mattresses that had been set out for when the Pack was home. Scott followed behind somewhat more reluctantly, as if he could think of a few other places he’d rather be, but Stiles seemed just as comfortable in the old train station as if he were lounging casually in his own bedroom, his feet thrown up and his hands behind his head, which were adorned with…

“Are those antlers?” he said, narrowing his eyes at the celebratory headdress.

“Yes, you like?” Stiles grinned at him.

“I told him they looked stupid,” Scott put in.

“I think they’re…festive,” Derek said and Stiles shot up like an arrow, pointing at Scott with an even brighter grin on his face than before.

“See!? Even the Sourwolf thinks they’re festive!”

“Unbelievable,” Scott muttered, putting a pillow over his face.

“What the hell is all this stuff anyways?” Derek said, awkwardly handling the packages.

“Why don’t you open ‘em and find out?”

Derek moved to open the first one after shooting Stiles a dubious look. He reached inside of the bag and pulled out a medium sized book. Derek flipped through it. “What is this?”

“It’s a scrapbook.”

“A scrapbook…?” Derek asked, “What do you think I am, a lonely housewife? I don’t even have a camera to take pictures with.”

Stiles motioned at the second one. “Open the other one.”

Derek peeked into the second one. “And…you got me a camera. Stiles, this must’ve cost a fortune. You should take this back. I’m really not the photography type.”

Stiles rolled his eyes, then got up from his position and instead sat down next to Derek, who was suddenly very aware of just how close they were. He could smell the body wash that Stiles had bathed with just that morning—Axe, by the smell of it—and the faint smell of cookies.

“Look, I know this year must be tough for you,” Stiles began, and Derek froze, not liking where this was going.

“I don’t need your pity,” Derek said, standing and tossing the bag back at Stiles, who quickly caught it and set it aside, following Derek as he tried to stalk out of the room.

“Hey, wait.” Stiles grabbed the sleeve of Derek’s shirt, causing him to stop unless he wanted to be one sleeve short this Christmas. “This isn’t about pity. It’s about understanding. You’re not the only person that’s lost somebody.”

“I didn’t just lose somebody, Stiles! I lost everybody!” Derek shouted, surprising himself.

To his amazement, Stiles didn’t bat an eyelid. He must be losing his touch. Still, he was completely unprepared for the soft touch on his shoulder. “I know that. I know. It’s different. But you’ve had a long time to come to terms with that loss. Your sister’s is much more recent.”

Derek clenched his jaw and ran a hand through his hair. “What are you trying to prove, Stiles?”

“That you’re not as alone as you think.” Stiles paused, then stepped closer. “When my mom died, I thought that nobody could possibly understand what it felt like. I felt completely alone. But my dad, he got me a camera that Christmas, and a scrapbook, and he said, ‘Son, you lost someone very important to you. Nothing can make that go away. But just because you can’t make new memories with your mother doesn’t mean you can’t make new memories. You have people who care about you, people that love you. The best thing you can do is to live your life, and take many pictures so that when you’re missing her, when you’re feeling blue, you can look at pictures and realize that there are still good things in life.’”

Derek listened to all this, trying to keep his frustrations to a minimum. He never was good at dealing with his emotions, and he didn’t particularly appreciate having to face them when he was trying his best to forget them.

“Derek, you’re not alone. You’ve got your Isaac and Erica and Boyd, hell, you even got Scott, whether he admits it or not,” Stiles said, and suddenly, he was in front of him again, close enough that he could feel his breath tickling the exposed skin just under his Adam’s Apple, “And, you’ve got me. I know I’m not much, but considering the fact that I’m human and I still put up with you, I’m pretty much a big deal. You lost a sister, Derek. You can’t get her back, and I’m sorry about that, but you’ve got another family. You’ve got the Pack.”

Slowly, Derek relaxed. “Fine,” he said, “I’ll keep your stupid camera. But I’m not scrapbooking. I still have some self-respect.”

Stiles chuckled. “We’ll see about that, Sourwolf.” Stiles patted his biceps and moved back over to the fire, jumping on Scott and interrupting his napping.

Derek shook his head and made to join them, but suddenly, there was a loud commotion and he looked back towards the entrance to his hideout.

Isaac was in the lead, Boyd and Erica close behind. They were grinning and holding up a bottle of liquor. “We’re home!” Erica shouted.

“What…?”

“We didn’t think it was right, leaving you here all alone on Christmas. After all, you’ve been like a family to us, when even our own families weren’t,” Isaac explained.

“But I wanted you to spend the holidays with your actual family,” Derek growled in a long-suffering voice.

“And we did,” Boyd put in. “But now, we’re back. So, let’s crack this open, shall we?”

Derek shook his head, unable to keep the small smile from creeping up onto his face, then turned around.

Suddenly, a flash exploded and Stiles cackled like a mad person. “Got it!” he shouted, “you should be a model, Derek. I’ve never seen a more perfect blur.”

“I guess you forgot that you can’t take a picture of a werewolf,” Derek pointed out.

“Nah, I remembered. But if you squint really hard, you can tell which blur is which. You have to admit, there’s a certain _je ne sais quoi_   to it.”

“You’re a moron,” Derek said, yanking the camera out of his hands.

“Hey!” Stiles protested, and Derek quickly snapped a picture of him.

“Oh, it’s hideous,” Derek said, making a face.

“Now that’s just uncalled for!” Stiles said, but Derek laughed and plopped down in between him and Scott. Stiles really was a moron, but he had been right. He did have a family. It wasn’t the same, but it was still a good one, and that was all he wanted for Christmas.


End file.
